Monday 11.07.11: THE CHAIN GANG OF 1974 / THE ONE AM RADIO / THE DEATH KIT / EVAN VOYTAS @ Echo

8:30pm / FREE / 21+

The Chain Gang of 1974 || Listen || Watch
“My brothers and I were surrounded by music growing up,” explains Kamtin Mohager, the shape-shifting singer/multi-instrumentalist behind the Chain Gang of 1974. “Not Beatles albums or anything like that; more like the Persian records our parents played all the time. And when we got older, it was up to us to discover everything.” Born in San Jose and raised in Hawaii, Mohager spent his first 13 years obsessing over inline hockey and the idea of being drafted by the NHL one day. A series of life-changing events were set in motion once Mohager’s family moved to Colorado, however. The first of which involved the final scene from Real Genius—quite possibly Val Kilmer’s finest hour—and its penultimate ‘popcorn song’, a.k.a. “Everybody Rules the World.” “I love ‘80s music, but not typical new-wave stuff,” says Mohager. “Like I’m way into Tears For Fears and Talk Talk, the other side of the spectrum, really.” That’s abundantly clear on White Guts, a record that’s nearly as restless as Chain Gang’s previous collection of early recordings, Fantastic Nostalgic. The way Mohager sees it, his first proper release was “all over the place, from a piano ballad to songs that sound like Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, Primal Scream or Justice.” White Guts, on the other hand, funnels three years of instrument-swapping, sample-splicing experience into a lean, focused listen. So while “Stop!” and the rather epic “Hold On” hint at everything from LCD Soundsystem to Talking Heads, they make perfect sense in the context of deep cuts like the synth-flecked “Don’t Walk Away” and bass-guided “Matter of Time,” shimmering power ballads that could have been on the soundtrack of Sixteen Candles or Pretty in Pink.

The One AM Radio || Listen || Watch
The One AM Radio is a trio based in Los Angeles, where the sun hasn’t completely thawed their New England roots. They make music about the feeling you get while driving home, fast, late at night, through half-empty streets.

The project began in New England, where Hrishikesh Hirway was studying design and photography at Yale. With a borrowed guitar, a 4-track, and a drum machine, he made cassettes for his friends and his sister to fall asleep to—instrumental lullabies mixed with staticky murmurs of talk radio.

Hirway started writing lyrics and singing over his music, and began performing, using what he’d written on the label on the first cassette — “The One AM Radio” — as a moniker.

Ted Leo gave Hrishikesh his real start and his first release, after the two played a show together, inviting him to come record in Boston at Radium City, Ted’s home recording studio. Those recordings were released as a split 7-inch with Ted Leo and the Pharmacists.

Because of Hrishikesh’s musical roots, The One AM Radio became an unlikely part of the DIY hardcore scene, playing and touring alongside screamy punk bands in sweaty basements. The homemade recordings were released in the form of EPs and 7”s on a variety of hardcore labels, as well as Hirway’s own DIY imprint, Translucence….. Dangerbird Records

Death Kit || Listen || Watch
“…Success in catchy tunes and high energy. The sound comes across as being very similar to The Rapture, especially when the singer busted out his cowbell-on-a-stick. In fact, the singer truly impressed with his onstage work ethic, adding secondary percussion and keyboards to his enthusiastic vocals, and even managed to cover a lot of ground when he wasn’t preoccupied. I’m not a dancer, but Death Kit provided the kind of music that it was hard not to move your body to.”One Thirty BPM

Dirty Ghosts || Listen || Watch
The Dirty Ghosts are pale and unwashed, yet they are fresh. Though based on solid ideas, the band is always attempting to get new with their style!!!! They are basically like a kid in a mask shop, always putting on weird new music masks, then having a hard time taking off the masks, so when they pick new masks, they just pull them over the old masks. The genre of music they do should be called “Layered Mask”. They are all musicians and they all want to make melodies that fight their way into your head like a controlling babysitter. Allyson handles electric guitar while Binks handles electric bass and Aesop handles the beat machines and this suits all of them just fine. Allyson and Carson have been collaborating for years, playing out ideas in the basement until the songs arrive via mental fax machine. So put a quarter in the fax machine and listen to a singing piece of paper.

Evan Voytas || Listen || Watch
Pennsylvania-bred, L.A.-based Evan Voytas makes spacey, whimsical synth-pop that borders on the cheeky, but there’s more than a little bit of soul in the series of EPs and singles he has self-released so far. Prior to his relocating to Los Angeles, Voytas apprenticed as a sideman for teen phenom Teddy Geiger; Voytas has an innate feel for a pop song’s workings but tinkers with the constructs like a gamer. He’s come a a long way in two-plus years in L.A., and with a (still-untitled) full-length album finished, it’s a good bet some record labels will be sniffing around very soon..Buzz Bands